So CrypticPW, once again, stop me from buying bundles (for Dragon server) on the website for some weird reason. I am located in Russia, play on Dragon and can't buy bundles without going and messing with VPNs and stuff. Extremely dissatisfied.
That's how the webpage looks for me:
And that's what I see if I try to go directly to a bundle's page (without a VPN.)
Comments
Does Netflix also offer you a 3 week-long subscription instead of a month based on where you live? It's not about the pricing, it's about the qualities of an item in the store, i.e. the neat even number of 1000 Zen is only available in the US store, but not in the EU nor Russian one. The way Netflix charges is the item you buy retains its qualities, it's just the price that changes, which is apparently not the case with PWE. Which is exactly what I was talking about.
The usage of VPN is supposed to pretend you are from the target location (such as pretend you are in US). If your VPN service cannot do it, there is something wrong with your VPN service.
I am well aware of what VPN is and what purpose it serves, which is easily proven by the aforementioned fact that I've made more than one purchase using the exact same method from the exact same store as long ago as November. The Zen charged had arrived in about 2 hours after the transaction. It's not that I'm complaining on 403-forbidden error trying to blame the company. Everything seems perfectly legit, it's just the exact same transaction as those coming through in November can't get through in December any longer. Would suspect they don't like my Ukrainian card in their US store, but that exact same card was used a month ago with no complaint, and it's still possible to use it in the EU store just as fine.
Yes, some call that "cheating" but many are doing that.
Just to clarify, the usage of VPN was recommended to me by one of the GM in response to a support ticket regarding both copying characters to a preview server and charging Zen to a Dragon server while being located in Ukraine. Their reasoning for resorting to it was that there was no easier workaround for these issues. The reason for the ticket is that if you happen to be located anywhere near Russia, the only preview server available to you without VPN will be Lurker, and the only server you can choose for charging from the Arc store is Drider. So it would be quite absurd for PWE to consider VPN as cheating under any circumstances, considering they're the ones recommending it.
P.S. Shoutout for Cryptic for snapping this very comment out of existence the first time, unless it's there and I just can't see it for some mysterious reasons. In which case apologies for repetition.
"Yes, some call that "cheating" but many are doing that" comment was not about Cryptic but more about Netlfix. Netflix even wanted to shut that (the VPN connection from oversea) down couple years ago.
Now, considering the fact that this hypothetical German player doesn't play on some secluded German server with its own Zen store items and prices, but on the same international Dragon you and me do, they don't have any regional restrictions in terms of in-game content to deal with. They just pay their 1000 for a month of VIP and are left to do whatever they want with the change they acquired solely due to the lack of options.
As for the local store it gets even better, because the minimal amount of Zen available is 660 for '200' (not sure 200 of what since there's no symbol, but assuming it displays UAH and not RUB for me, would be too low a price in RUB anyway). Now I haven't visited Drider in a while, but last I checked the price for example for 1 month of VIP was the exact same 1000 Zen, and not 660. Which means that despite the server I play on, with the local store I would have to buy 1320 Zen to afford a month of VIP instead of 1000 available for $10 and be left with a 320 spare Zen I never asked for. Sure, would be just a measly 100 had I bought from EU, the exact number is not the issue here. The principle is very similar to the idea of selling a 3-week or 5-week long Netflix subscription instead of a monthly one, and the logic behind it is.. what? the desire to keep the price tag cute and even?
Meanwhile Netflix, being a respectable streaming service, has only 1 item on their store, which has nothing to do with the list of movies available in different countries, and that is a monthly price. Sure, the number fluctuates from country to country because the exchange rates etc, it's kinda obvious to anyone remotely familiar with online shopping, and the prices may look less neat when converted from EU, but it doesn't concern the notion of monthly in any way.
i.e. US pricing still does not do you any better for this argument.
By the way, I would never pay 800 Zen for 1 month VIP. I would only pay 6 month VIP with at least 30% discount.